On Tuesday, 17 May, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell stated that the EU Member States’ military support to Ukraine was “making a difference [on] the battlefield”.
“We have to replenish resources and their stockpiles, and [...] the support at that moment is critical because the war is [at] a critical moment, [at] a turning point”, he emphasised after a meeting of European defence ministers, during which they spoke remotely with Ukrainian Minister of Defence Oleksii Reznikov. “We cannot let Ukraine [...] run out of equipment, and we will not”, he promised; meanwhile, the Ukrainians have launched a counter-offensive in the Donbas.
As an example, Mr Borrell reiterated that Member States had agreed to allocate an additional €500 million from the ‘European Peace Facility’ to help Ukraine—a total of €2 billion since the beginning of the war. The High Representative pleaded, “We have to continue until the end” of the war.
Not wanting to speculate how long Russia could continue to fight, Mr Borrell explained that, “if it is true”, Russia has already lost 15% of its troops, which would be “a world record [for] losses of an army invading a country”, adding that it had suffered enormous material losses. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)